Even my mould is nuclear orange-spotted case discussion

[Stockwell]

Here's a case I thought I would share with other breeders. There is often concern and question about mould on eggs, what it means, what should be done to prevent it, and whether it spreads to kill viable eggs.
My observations through the years have always been that mould starts only on poorly calcified, weak, or infertile eggs and generally wont spread to kill viable eggs.
I almost never remove infertile eggs from a clutch if they are adhering to good eggs, nor do I do anthing to try to stop the mould.
Here's a case study for your observation.
This small clutch of spotted pythons consisted of a dozen eggs. At first they all looked good, but transillumination (candling) revealed 4 eggs with no embryo, no blood vessels.
As time passed the non viable eggs began to mould rather badly. Some surrounding good eggs were almost covered with mould from the surrounding bad eggs, although it wasn't really growing well or spreading on the good eggs. An interesting "nuclear orange" mould eventually took over and liquid seeped from the rotting eggs and made quite an interesting mess.

I purposely made no attempt to interfere or remove the mould, so I could photograph nature taking its course.
The 8 good eggs all hatched perfectly healthy baby pythons... All this despite being surrounded by mould...
here's how it looked





The photo below shows an egg which was completely surrounded by non viable decomposed eggs. When the baby in the good egg pipped the mouldy dead egg fell off, and is seen next to the hatchling.
This baby emerged from a sea of mould, but is perfectly healthy... Note the egg tooth is visible

[VooDooMafia]

Great pics Roy.

Thanks for the little lesson on mould, its good to know that it would not just run rampid and kill everythign around it (good eggs)

[mykee]

Roy, do these babies glow in the dark?

[marisa]

That mould looks like powdered cheese!

It's amazing what eggs go through and still hatch. Nature builds the best defenses to protect the next generations.

Thanks for sharing!

Marisa

[Stockwell]

Yup, but only after they're paid for!

[CHRISANDBOIDS14]

YUM! Not! LOL. Thanks for the pics! Very interesting findings!

C.

[Jeff_Favelle]

GREAT post! Moral:? Patience is a VIRTUE.

[crocdoc]

I'm glad the internet hasn't developed scratch and smell technology, yet. Haha..

Speaking of mould on eggs, all of my lace monitor eggs developed mould around two months into incubation. It wasn't the brightly coloured mould characteristic of dead or dying eggs, but a subtle, velvety coating that gave the eggs a soft focus look. After a while it looked as though the eggs had flecks of sand or dust on them and on close examination this turned out to be where the mould concentrated into clumps. The egg containers had a vaguely mouldy smell, so there was little doubt it was a fungus of some sort.

At first I thought this meant the eggs were doomed, but when I noticed that the mould hadn't advanced at all a month or three later I guessed that it was living on the surface of the shells only. Since then the first clutch has hatched and the second (which has the same mould on it) is still going well and expected to hatch in a month or so.

[BoidKeeper]

So what about foot powder, am I wasting my time and or possibily harming the eggs?
Great pics Roy,
Trevor

[vanderkm]

Excellent photos and demonstration - I have some eggs with just the fuzzy white kind as part of a cal king clutch this year. Have taken out the solitary ones that molded, but left the attached ones alone and can now expect the adjacent ones that candled good will hatch, despite the mold.

What I find interesting is that some infertile eggs that seem to develop mold are laid as white shelled and looking indistinguishable from normal fertile eggs. I have always heard that slugs are those that are not fertilized and yet from my above clutch, there were several that looked white and clean on the outside and completely empty when candled, like the infertile ones in this clutch. Do you think these are fertilized and the embryo dies early?

I guess I wonder about being able to compare to bird eggs, where hens will lay eggs with complete white shells when they are sexually mature, without any exposure to males, but if they lay yellow, shell-less, or deformed eggs it is often an indication of an underlying viral infection or dietary problem. I know snakes aren't chickens, but makes me wonder if slugs are really a result of infertility, or maybe something else.

mary v.

[MarcB]

Neat pictures and information Roy!

Thanks for sharing

[marisa]

Mary- I have one egg in my current clutch that is exactly how you describe. It has not sunken in, it is not mouldy, it looks 100% full and white. Yet when I candle, its a deep yellow, not a pinkish like the fertile eggs.

I am interested to hear thoughts on your question too.

Marisa

[Stockwell]

Mary that is an excellent question, and you're quite right there is a very distinct visual difference between slugs, and properly shelled non viable eggs. I suspect they are in fact two different conditions
I'm not positive on this but I would speculate that the waxy things we call slugs are ova that have never seen sperm.
I think the white shelled normal looking eggs that never get blood vessels and contain mostly transparent fluid, are possibly eggs that were fertilized, but something went wrong very early on. I have sutdied and dissected some of those eggs that never develope embryos, and most I have opened have small red blood spots or similar minute evidence of very early life that might have stopped for unknown reasons. So perhaps they were fertilized with weak or defective sperm, or some other early chemical process failed and the normal division, and cell growth was halted.

[BoidKeeper]

What about foot powder?

[Stockwell]

foot powder is nonsense in my estimation. It probably will slow mould growth, by why bother worrying about it.
I remember early in Corey's breeding days, he used foot powder, as he was terrified he was losing a clutch of burms...
However the good eggs hatched, the bad eggs didn't...and I think this would have been the case with or without an antifungal.
But I bet their feet smelled great